Car Insurance No Claims Bonus Explained
By Andrew Bowen

No Claims Bonus is a term used to describe the number of years you have had Car Insurance without making a claim. Put simply, if you have had Car Insurance for 4 years and you have not made a claim in that time, then you have 4 years No Claims Bonus. No Claim Bonus is probably the single biggest factor affecting the cost of your Car Insurance premium. Every year that goes by without you making a claim is another year of No Claims Bonus.

Generally speaking, the more No Claims Bonus years you have, the cheaper your premium will be for the car you need to insure. This is because Car Insurance companies can see that your history regarding making any accident claim is a good one.

When changing provider, Car Insurance companies will usually ask you to prove your No Claims Bonus in the form of a renewal notice or a letter from your current Car Insurance company. If you have several years of No Claims Bonus but then make a claim, the Car Insurance company will usually apply it's rules of how much to knock back your No Claims Bonus Years. Some companies such as Accept Direct http://www.acceptdirect.co.uk offer to protect your No Claims Bonus for an extra fee during the quotation process. Having full no claims bonus can also entitle you up to 75% discount on your car insurance premium.

How the No Claims Bonus or No Claims Discount Works
By Alevoor Rajagopal

How the No Claims Bonus or No Claims Discount Works A no claims bonus on your car insurance is a discount awarded on a renewal premium against the consideration not having made a payable claim in a valid previous year of insurance.

Simply put, a no claims bonus is applied at the time of renewal of a policy which certainly reduces the premium. However, a no claims bonus is applicable payable if there has not been claim paid in the previous year.

A no claims bonus is applied at origination of a policy and it varies from one insurer to another but typically will be in between 60-75% over five years and is applied as a discount on car insurance premium. There are companies that offer no claims bonus beyond 6 years of claims free policy years.

No Claims bonus is lost if... No claims bonus is to be earned through a whole year's claim free driving and still it is not something to cover future faults. This is what takes away much or all of no claims bonus in general cases of theft, at-fault accidents and in all similar cases where the insurer cannot recover its cost from anyone else. It may be hard to believe but, in reality, insurers pressurize drivers to not to admit responsibility for accidents.

In other accident situations where insurers have mutually identified each other and none having admitted responsibility, they will share their cost in any proportion at the cost of the combined no claims bonus.

Mandated Electronic Claims Filing – Some Insurance Carriers Mandate Electronic Claims Filing...By Michele Redmond

They’ve been talking about it forever but it looks like it might finally have arrived. Insurance companies are starting to mandate electronic submissions of insurance claims. We've gotten our first notice that medical insurance claims must be sent electronically in 2007.

Many insurance companies have been trying to encourage providers to submit insurance claims electronically for years. They’ve offered perks such as quicker payments, less requirements for authorizations, and other benefits to the providers. They’ve also had provider reps visit provider’s offices to see why they are not submitting claims electronically and offer suggestions for methods to get their office capable of sending their claims electronically.

Now we are actually seeing companies that are saying they will no longer accept claims on paper CMS 1500 or HCFA 1500 forms. Fidelis Care of New York is one of the plans that is stating they will no longer accept any claims on paper in 2007. They state they are at over 80% electronic claims and they are not accepting any more paper claims in 2007. If you are a participating provider in Fidelis Care and you try to submit your claims on paper, they will be returned to you with a letter. They are advising you to contact your provider rep and they will help you find a method to submit your claims electronically.

Fidelis Care is one of the first insurance companies that I’ve seen that is actually returning any paper claims. Excellus BCBS keeps track of how many claims each provider submits on paper and if the number is over a certain amount per month, they send a provider representative out to speak to the provider about why they are not submitting claims electronically, but they don’t return the claims – yet. New York Medicare states that all providers are suppose to submit claims electronically, but they allow enough exclusions that an office can get around it.